AfreecaTV Co Ltd

KOSDAQ:067160

Earnings Call Transcript 2024-Q1

[Unknown Executive]

Welcome to live conference of Soop's Q1 2024 Earnings. Greetings again. This is [ Eun Minxi ], the Soop streamer. When you go out to the world, people say that you have to look at the tree -- look at the whole forest, not the tree. And the forest, it means Soop in Korea, and it would be a meaningful start. This live conference is open to anyone who is interested in Soop, but as it is related to earnings, only those who have registered in advance can ask questions in the chat.

Today, we have CEO, Jung Chan-Yong; Ellen Kim, Head of IR; and [ Ila Chan ], IR Manager. Will you say Hi to those who have joined us this morning? How about you? Now starting with you, CEO, Chan.

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Well, I'm going to say -- I'm going to start with those who gave us Star Balloons. Thank you so much. I don't know if [ Cheong Taeyang ] is the one that I know. Anyway, welcome to Soop Incorporated and this is our very first live conference with a new name. So we are embarking on a new journey and we're very happy that we're back with great results from Q1. And for the rest of year, of course, we are preparing many things, and we're putting on a lot of efforts and we will communicate with you on those efforts.

[Unknown Executive]

How about you, Ellen?

[Kim Jiyeon, executive]

Good morning, everybody. Ellen from Soop. Soop, the name itself, it's a little bit unfamiliar still. So I'm kind of saying it to myself too. As CEO said, and also, as streamer said, we would like to look at the whole Soop, the whole forest, and then we get into all the details of each tree. And thank you so much for joining us for the Q1 results.

[Unknown Executive]

How about you, Ila?

[Unknown Executive]

Good morning. I'm Ila Chan from IR. Very happy to be back with good results from Q1 and please look forward to the briefing and also the Q&A. Hope you have very fun and also fruitful time. Okay. So, Ila, how do you plan to proceed today? Today, we will first present our business performance and results for the Q1 this year, followed by a Q&A session. Okay, then, without further ado, let's go right into it. And we're going to get into the briefing of the results. And Ms. Chan take us away. Thank you. Let me present you our Q1 2024 business performance and earnings. In the first quarter, Soop has been more proactive than ever in communicating with new streamers and users and helping them settle down and striving to improve the platform through service updates.

The new winds blowing through Soop have not only expanded the content diversity and scale, but also stimulated our community, creating a virtuous cycle that exceeded our expectation. We've seen a significant increase in active streamers, new subscribers and new users and the number of concurrent streaming show and viewers as well as an increase in live viewing time, DAUs and all the other interactive metrics that show the activeness of streamers and users. At the same time, the remarkable growth in both the number of streamers receiving Star Balloons for the first time and paying user indices is a sign of the healthy ecosystem that adds vitality to our platform as well as welcomes new communities, and we take this a very meaningful step.

We also changed our company name, as you know. Prior to the rebranding of our domestic platform in the third quarter, we changed our name from AfreecaTV Corporation to Soop Corporation at our Annual General Meeting on March 29, with an aspiration for infinite connections and possibilities. Soop is also the name of our global platform service and the new name of our domestic AfreecaTV service after the rebranding. This decision carries great weight and significance as it is the first rebranding in 11 years since we changed our name to AfreecaTV Corporation in 2013 and the first rebranding since the launch of the AfreecaTV beta service in 2005.

We are preparing for the domestic Soop platform as if it's a brand new service, not just rebranding and we're using this as an opportunity to strengthen our domestic service and draw a blueprint for our long-term success.

We have been preparing for the global Soop as part of our long-term growth strategy. It's scheduled to launch beta service in May. The beta service will focus on functionalities and will offer a full range of global services and the initial version will be available in English, Thai, traditional Chinese and simplified Chinese. After launching the beta service strategically, we'll go through a period of service stabilization while acquiring contents, especially for gaming and eSports live streaming. As such, Soop is taking in all the positive changes taking place in the domestic platform and preparing to take its first steps as a full-fledged global platform. Building on the company's growth so far this year will be a milestone year for us as we prepare for another big leap forward.

Now, our business results in Q1 2024. The Q1 revenue stands at KRW 95 billion, down 5% Q-o-Q and up 31% Y-o-Y. Platform revenue recorded KRW 78.7 billion, seeing a 21% growth Q-o-Q on paying user basis. Platform revenue increased by 15% Q-o-Q and 30% Y-o-Y. Advertisement revenue in [ Q1 ] was KRW 15.2 billion, a 49% decrease Q-o-Q and a 33% growth Y-o-Y. More specifically, platform advertisement decreased 45% Q-o-Q and 37% Y-o-Y due to the continued slowdown in the ad market. And as the effects of the year-end advertising peak ended, branded content declined 57% Q-o-Q, but grew 22% Y-o-Y. Other advertisement decreased 28% Q-o-Q but grew 349% Y-o-Y. Thanks to the CTTD sales, which has been consolidated since Q3 2023.

Moving on to operating expenses. For the first quarter of this year, the operating expense recorded KRW 66.3 billion, which is a 10% decrease Q-o-Q and a 22% hike Y-o-Y. The Q-o-Q decline in operating expense is driven primarily by a reduction in related variable costs due to a decrease in advertising revenue while Y-o-Y upturn is mainly attributable to the rise in employment costs from more hiring and platform revenue growth, which brought variable costs up. Paying charge, which is a variable cost in nature, totaled KRW 12.5 billion, marking a 16% increase Q-o-Q and a 48% rise Y-o-Y due to the growth in platform revenue.

Advertising commissions amounted to KRW 7.1 billion, dropping by 53% Q-o-Q in line with the declining trend of advertising revenue, yet increasing by 23% Y-o-Y. Content production costs recorded KRW 1.6 billion, declining by 52% Q-o-Q and 46% down Y-o-Y due to the absence of large-scale content production, such as e-sports. Fixed costs included employment costs, which increased by 11% Q-o-Q due to the wage hikes and an increase in the number of consolidated workforce. This resulted in a KRW 22.4 billion expenses, a 25% increase Y-o-Y, reflecting the impact of employment costs from the consolidated subsidiaries. For other commissions, such as broadcasting rights and others, it decreased by 15% Q-o-Q due to the elimination of the effects of Asian Games broadcasting rights acquisition, yet it surged by 14% Y-o-Y to KRW 6.4 billion.

As per streamer support, the section recorded KRW 2 billion, marking a 10% increase Q-o-Q and a 53% jump Y-o-Y partly due to more contracts signed with streamers. Dedicated line usage fees amounted to KRW 4.2 billion, escalating by 15% Q-o-Q and 12% Y-o-Y due to more broadcasting and viewing activities in this quarter. Finally, in the case of other expenses, onetime expenses related to affiliates were eliminated this time around, resulting in a 19% drop to KRW 4.2 billion, which represents a 22% increase Y-o-Y.

Now turning to profit. The operating profit for the first quarter reached KRW 28.7 billion, growing by 9% Q-o-Q and 56% Y-o-Y. With the rapid growth in platform sales, operating profit margin was recorded at 30.2%. The first quarter's net profit was KRW 24.8 billion, an increase of 54% Q-o-Q and 50% Y-o-Y. This growth is attributable to the increase in operating profit and elimination of the negative impact of the affiliates goodwill impairment from the previous quarter. Finally, please refer to the annual financial statement. Thank you all for your attention.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Ila for that. So that was the performance and highlights of the first quarter. If there are any questions, please feel free to write them down. So let's open the questions to anyone who is interested in this. I understand that so far, we've already received many Star Balloons. So thank you so much for that. And from [ Astellalive ], this person became the 336th fan in our fan club. So thank you very much.

So the first quarter, I believe we did very good, and I want to congratulate you all. Any words?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes. So when it comes to the operating profit, I believe it was probably one of the best so far. I don't think there were any substantial costs involved in the previous quarter. But not only that what really matters is that we have seen a great number of paying users this time. There were other streamers that came to and migrated to us from the others. And there were already community that had been built previously that have moved to us altogether. So usually, it takes time to have more paying users. But luckily, in our cases, they turned into paying users right away as they migrated to us. So that was great.

And after the Twitch exited from the Korean market, I believe that we have these new users and new streamers, and they are growing with one another, and that is a great harmony. So thank you very much for that.

[Unknown Executive]

A question from Cha Minuh from Goldman Sachs. It seems like that you have grown your traffic coming from the Twitch and these are the high-quality people. And my question is, what's your long-tail plan for the casual traffic? And what are some of the efforts being made for you to make sure that this diversified users can really settle in your new platform of Soop or rebranded platform of Soop?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes, I think I can answer to that question. So we have a platform business and these are some of the very, very important traffic and these indexes are very, very crucial, as you can see. And MUV as well is extremely crucial, which is why we keep on sharing with you. MUV growth, I think is going on pretty solidly at this point. But not only MUV, but one thing that we really pay close attention is all these indexes that shows you the activities.

What I mean by activities, it includes DUV and log-in portion. And also, it includes the participation to engagement, to gifting, and also the time they stay on it, like the retention, the drill times and all that. So if it's not like a community platform like we are, if it's just like a regular community, all that matters is MUV, of course, but we're different. Our platform is based upon the sense of community. That's what sets us apart. So this activity to indexes are extremely crucial on top of the MUV, I would say.

The other services or platforms that don't have this kind of community sense are very different from us and they cannot succeed in the long term. So for us, when we say traffic, it's the MUV and all the other activities that we look at in a broader sense. So like I keep saying, when one streamer comes in, there's about 30 or so in the community. If that can be set, I believe that we can definitely see a strong value as a community. So that's an important factor that I would like to highlight.

And you mentioned diversified user. That's very correct. In terms of the age, the genre and the age, they're very, very diversified. And in the past, when we had the AfreecaTV as a name, there were some people that would go along this AfreecaTV, but there are people that would also try something new. And the harmony between these people are amazing. And we're doing a great job already. And we want to take it to the next level. That's why as a platform, we need to put all our efforts.

And this can be done by all the support programs and the care programs that we have already been supporting. And that's what has set us apart. But not only that, we have the production facilities and the services as a platform itself. And this production aspect of it is very, very important. And in fact, we've made a lot of investment just for that. We have not had a production function, as you know.

Back in 2000, I don't know exactly when, but we acquired a production company to us and that's why we have grown this production capabilities. We have the FreecUP Studio. We only had one before, but we have now in [ Chamshil ] and other areas in Seoul. We've expanded ourselves. And with the growth of the eSports, the game category itself has really grown because we have more streamers being ever more active with our support in that. So this kind of effort will continue to grow and even step up down the road.

With global Soop, which is slated to be opened in the May, actually, it's not going to be any later than that. So May is the time for this opening and with global Soop and Korea AfreecaTV are going to create the synergy effect, thanks to the production capabilities that we have here in Korea. So that will be one of our major strategies down the road.

[Unknown Executive]

Yes, that sounds amazing. You mentioned 2 main strategies that sets you apart. Thank you for that. Samsung Securities' Oh Dong Hwan gave us a question. Thank you so much for great results. And now global Soop will be launched in the Southeast Asia, where competition is quite fierce. What is your strategy in terms of entering that market? Can you get into the details?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes. The Southeast Asian market is quite competitive. But it's been quite a long time. About 2 years ago, we -- when we picked this market as our global market, but the competition scale has subdued. And also not just the Twitch but also all other platforms in that region has been downsizing. And even though they have many streamers who are active, but there has been some changes to the landscape.

And global Soop has eSports production and eSports business and eSports team. And game-centered platform services are some of our fortes. So that gives us differentiation. And we're going to take advantage of our assets with Korean team, and we can do many things in collaboration with Korean teams and it will be very exciting. So in terms of competition, we feel very confident that we won't have any problem.

[Unknown Executive]

Next question comes from Kim Dohyoung from CLSA. Looking at the MUV of March, it seems like the effect from the Twitch exit is minimal after February. What's the trend like in April and how do you see that happening in the future?

And also CTTD acquisition, the impact to it as for the advertising revenue has been limited. And especially, the platform ads sales have gone down rather sharp. What is your turnaround expectation?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes, it's usually the MUV if you look at it. The peak was in February because the 2 major ones [indiscernible] they all began in February. That's why you're right on that. But depending on how you see it, the MUV growth may seem minimal. But I would say that like I just mentioned early on, the focus should not be on MUV only. We should look at other activity indexes.

However, if you want to talk about the MUV, the Twitch had the [ Mygapple4 ]. And we are dividing it with [ DigiTech ], other player, and I don't know what happened to the other players because they were global users, they will not be using it anymore or they just kind of like organically left the market. I'm talking about the users themselves who are not there.

But the point is, if you look at the volume, we don't exactly know if DigiTech's number is that accurate, to be honest with you. So MUV, we are actually very conservative when it comes to counting the MUV because we're not even counting the web, the MUV at all, because I understand there's repetitions, redundancies depending on the base stations. And we want to be very conservative. That's why the numbers may not be as big as it could actually be. And we can also apply the log-in versus non-log-in when we're counting the MUV. So I think what we're going to do is maybe see what we can do in changing the way we count MUV this time.

Maybe we can look at it as an yearly perspective, not monthly. And as for the advertisements, compared to fourth quarter, the platform, yes, the platform sales from the advertisements did go down sharp, but there's always a trend depending on which quarter you're looking at. And the second quarter is getting better than the first quarter.

And as for our, ads business, we have to stay focused, and we know that there are outside environment that impacts us no matter what. But we have this branded content that really sets us apart. And I think we can utilize this and leverage it for a turnaround. But I do understand that there isn't any groundbreaking type of change because we are not free from the market situations. And that's why I want to be conservative here when we talk about this. But let's say maybe this end of this year.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you all very much. Yes, it'll be wonderful if you can stay tuned for the second and third quarter. Another question from [ Shinan ]. Chinese commerce companies are entering the Korean market very aggressively, and the target is quite young. Can Soop get advertisements from those advertisers?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes, we've been talking to them quite recently. We can't really say anything about the scale itself. The scale is not something we can disclose. But Chinese commerce companies are very eager to do large-sized campaign, marketing campaign. They told us. But there's nothing that's been confirmed in terms of how much that we can get advertisement from them. But of course, in the beginning, it would be kind of like testing the water type of advertisements. And then in the long term, we can see -- we can hope for the growth.

[Unknown Executive]

I mean, your answers are very clear and expressed very well. Another question is from Kim Dohyoung, again from CLSA. So Mr. Kim Dohyoung has sent us a question again. You changed your name, which has been there for a long time. So I see the strong commitment from executive levels for the rebranding. But I understand still there's a heavy dependence on certain categories in your overall business. So any plans for your rebranding and the future?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes. When it comes to the dependency you're talking about, that's true. I can't really say no to that. The question is different interpretations are available. I personally think that these categories that we have high dependence on is amazing and I'm very grateful because it's been the very basis for us to have this kind of growth. And also globally, that dependence, this can be also interpreted as stability, the basis, the foundation of our overall other businesses. And I know that we can utilize it as a stepping stone for us to even go into different areas and utilize other opportunities.

Now, the question about the rebranding, it's not simply about conceptual changes. What I mean is that I probably said it previously, the global Soop is based on the Korean AfreecaTV. But the back end is completely different. So we have the friction, our own protocol here in Korea. But globally, we use the OES space as more of a public one. And that's the basis of the back end for the global Soop. And in the long term, I believe the Korean AfreecaTV can also be integrated into the broader back end. That's one idea as well. We had this live streaming for AfreecaTV so far. And we will be able to make an infused changes to this with this new back end.

We are transitioning now and maybe this dependency will be dwindled a little bit. And as we expand, we may see a newer and a broader horizon. But this new branding isn't just simply changing our brand. It's really completely changing our services. In other words, if you look at the industry that we belong to, what industry is it? Over about a decade, we've had this upward trend the whole time. And me and all the others in AfreecaTV have worked hard, but that's not the only driver.

The industry, it's a streaming industry, the platform industry, social media industry. And these 3 things are not in its full maturity. Yes, we're growing. And when these markets reach that maturity, the full maturity, in that scenario, our platform will be something that is undefined by what we know now because it'll be infinitely great opportunities. And that's why we have rebranded ourselves for this new unlimited future. Thank you.

[Unknown Executive]

Analyst [ Yu Ji ] gave us 3 questions. One, could you elaborate on PU trend of Q1. Secondly, since you mentioned activity indices, can you share some related KPIs? Number 3, what are your plans for rebranded UI and UX?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Mr. Yu, I've been telling -- I mean, I think he gets it. He knows what kind of questions that he wants because Ellen is ready.

[Unknown Executive]

Okay. In terms of the paying users, as CEO said, of all the activity indices, the most significant index is paying user, and it's gone up quite high. The platform sales was very big. And in terms of the paying user, 21% growth is the growth that we saw since Q-o-Q. And if you see the overall trend, 21% growth is quite remarkable.

And the paying rate has gone up [ 1% ] point had gone up. And all the activity indices have gone up, especially DUV, 8% growth Q-o-Q and there's another index that we see is the viewing time of the users. Daily average viewing time, we saw hike -- 18% hike. And the monthly user engagement has also gone up 18%. So this is very significant. Active Twitch streamer, the number of them has gone up quite high, 9% growth Q-o-Q. And on the streamer side, the number of streamers who received balloons have also gone up quite high.

So in terms of the long-tail strategy was one of the questions that we got. Those strategies that we had implemented have been quite effective and this is the result. And the new -- the number of Star Balloons that received -- that the new streamers received have also gone up, too. And I would like to also elaborate on Twitch. The activity indices on the Twitch streamers who've come to Soop. We studied those. And as of end of January, we did the February call.

On Soop there's a number of active switch Twitch streamers. ATS used to be in February about 2,800, but now that ATS, active Twitch streamer has gone up to 4,700 people. That means active means that the Twitch streamer had at least 1 hour of show. And during the last quarter, the number of sessions, they recorded 77 number of accumulated sessions, and that means they're very active.

And in terms of paying users, we looked at the number of Star Balloons that they've received. Out of the -- all the unique users who give Star Balloons, they are 270,000 and 35% of them gave Star Balloons to the active Twitch streamers. This is quite significant because there are many ways that the Twitch streamers get settled down. They can rely on the Star Balloons that they receive, and this is a very good sign.

Of the 20% growth in paying users, you can see that the -- the 55% of number of unique gifting users never gifted Star Balloons before, and this is very meaningful and this as Q-o-Q. All the indices that reflect their activeness are very high and usually there's a time that takes, but the transition time was very short. So these are the indices that I can share.

You have to answer the number 3. Oh, UI/UX, I think you have to take this question.

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

In terms of Korean Soop rebranding, well our service is 24/7 service. And since because of that, UI/UX change cannot happen overnight, and we can't do that too often. And even changing from the personalized to my page, that took us quite a long time. And since we are looking into the third quarter, we are coming up with some ways to give changes to the UI and UX.

We are going to get rid of the legacy UIs. We want to make our Soop more trendy and that speak to younger generation because the new users are quite young. So the recent trend and the cool-looking UI will be applied. I mean, it would be wonderful if I can show you some of the samples, but we can't. But the direction of UI and UX is that the existing AfreecaTV legacy will be removed step by step.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you for these answers. Next question. It's from DB Financial Investment Ms. Shin Eun Jung. 2 questions. The first one, what's the reason behind the reduction in the content production cost and the guidance for the second quarter to the fourth quarter? The second question is does it say pay ratio? Yes, pay ratio. Let me enlarge this because we have hard time reading this tiny little fonts.

Anyways, back to the second question. What's the reason for the hike in the paying ratio and the -- yes, paying user number?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes. The second question, I think, has already been answered. We saw that like about 90 people…

[Unknown Executive]

90,000 people have sent these Star Balloons to the ATS, meaning active Twitch. And then 55% of them have never gifted before. So that's very meaningful. And the first question about the content production. In the first quarter, there was no eSports production. It actually -- it only starts from the February. And that's why not full of it is reflected.

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

If you look at the previous trend, usually it has always been the case, the reduction of the cost of the content production in the first quarter. But there was an issue of the DDoS. As you know, the games, especially production was, in fact, a bit hampered because of the DDoS attack. It's not just us, but the DDoS attack is pretty much everywhere. And usually, of course, like she mentioned, there's a seasonality for the production of the contents, but especially so in this time, first quarter because of the DDoS attacked, as you know.

As for the second to the fourth quarter, how do I see that happening? Well, branded content will maybe drive the expense up for the content production. But as for the DDoS, I have no idea. It has never been a challenging case before, and it's just to the level that we hadn't expected. And the game companies and platforms like ours, we've basically done everything possible in terms of the legal remedies. We've made all these cases and actions. But the question is how that's going to unfold. We have to watch and see.

[Unknown Executive]

Okay. Thank you very much for that answer. Next question is Kim Dohyoung from CLSA. I'm concerned because the 2.5-year long decline of PU has shown the limits of the existing ways of business and methodologies. And Digitech also is catching up quite fast, rising as a new competitor utilizing our negative brand image. So rebranding is a must, at least for ad base of Soop. What are your thoughts on catching the 2 birds of existing ways of business and also rebranding?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Very deep in-depth question. Can you go up? Oh, yes. Thank you. All right. Okay. So you're saying that rebranding and the existing ways of business, these are 2 birds that we have to catch. Okay, yes. So we have to create success based on the existing ways of business. And there are some limitations, because if we stick to the old way of business, and then we also have to do the rebranding, which is a different direction. So this is a very difficult, 2 birds that we have to catch, right? That's the question, right? Yes.

Well, this is what I'm thinking. When you do the case studies at a college or something, they do the SWOT analysis. So the corporation has to create something new out of an existing business, but then that company cannot follow the new trend and will fall behind. And there's another company that will challenge itself and will try to do something new. But then it will also flop because their core business flops. I mean, this is kind of the thing that you're concerned about. But what I can give you answer for is that you have to know the context.

You have to know the streaming and social media industries, the platform industry. Well, right now, it's growing, it's expanding. And within this context, fortunately, we are positioned in a very positive position. And global-wise, we're not that bad either. So all the things that -- all the fruits that we can reap from our existing business, we can't throw them away. We get them, but there got to be -- there's got to be something that we create even more based on that.

So we have to stick to our core business, what we can do best, and then we have to do the rebranding. So in terms of the weight, in the beginning, it'll be like 5 to 5, existing to rebranding 5 to 5. But on the long term it'll go to 4 to 6. But we can't really define on a certain period. And there's going to be some events that will become milestones that will become the driving force for the new business and we're creating that driving force. And we are doing all the things that we have to change the perception of our business and it creates such milestones that will drive our business and do the rebranding successfully. And we have to do that step by step.

The effectiveness, I don't know how effective it's going to be. It's not something that we can show you right away. But industry is bound to grow. And you will have -- we will have enough time to monitor the trend. I'm very confident. Based on the experience I have and based on the insights that I learned from my experience, I'm confident that we can catch those 2 difficult birds. But then, in terms of communicating to the stakeholders and persuading them and making sure that they understand, I'm sure it'll take time.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you very much for that very elaborate answer. Maybe I can ask an additional question. After rebranding -- besides the change of the UI, what are the immediate changes that the streamers and the viewers can see right away?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Thanks for the question. Our UI and UX are basically user experience. The experiences on the part of the users are very -- always important. The users that have been with us, they're very used to this old way. The newer store, newcomers, they need time to get themselves adjusted. So these 2 groups, the old, the traditional users and these new users have different expectations and different experiences so far. And we need to coordinate those differences.

We've had many shows and channels where we ourselves have gone out to explain and communicate partly. However, within our structure, there are certain things we cannot cover in terms of all full communication. And as we rebrand and introduce new services, we want to be able to do better communication and really better coordinate those differences.

It could be Twitch or the Digitech or us. We have different tones and manners, but we also have different functions and features. From the streamers' perspective now, as they stream, there are certain limitations of course they face and you know what I mean. The revenue, the activities, there are different dashboards available.

But from [indiscernible] you are the streamer, every day, you're involved in some sort of a show. And for a whole month are you able to see the statistics, not really, not precisely. You don't know the demographics of your users, the people that come to see you or the new users, and what are their behaviors. All these details are not able to be given to you in our current dashboards. But in the new services, as a streamer, in terms of managing your channel, you can get better information, better statistics in this new service in a very, very intuitive way. And this dashboard will be a great change and benefiting to the streamers.

Now, on the users' perspective, depending on their own activities, sometimes they are limited by certain -- confined by certain limitations. But we want to free them up. In fact, for us, from any service, when we, let's say, have 6 million users, giving them the same screen as UI is not difficult. But giving a personalized page to all 6 million is extremely challenging because we need to use all sort of data. We need to have a great logic. But that has to go with the back end change, back end upgrade. So from the users' experience and streamers' experiences in both perspectives, we just want to give out most optimized service. I hope that makes sense to you.

[Unknown Executive]

Yes, it definitely did. That makes sense. So I guess as a more personalized yet, very specialized way of interacting with a Soop both ways. Yes, just to add to that, in the long tail, we are all interested in that. UI/UX upgrade has always been very, very much of a focus, and there are many new features added to it. But not only that, from 2 years ago, we've already been moving towards this way already. We've been making some upgrades so far. We have introduced personalized services, and that allowed you to -- users to skip and filter out the things that you don't want to see.

And let's say, I want to only look at the game, not non-games or I want to see only the non-games, I'm not into game, in that case, we were able to tailor to those needs already for many months. In fact, from the second half of last year, we've been introducing these personalized services. It was step-by-step gradually already for some time.

And as Twitch streamers have really migrated to us in a large scale, we definitely upgrade our features and functions to a great extent. And my point is that we've been working towards this already for some time. And this new branding is, of course, to take us to the next level, but it also means that we're going to keep our core and add and tweak the new things. And I think there will be a great harmony of these 2 pillars. Thank you. So after the South Korea's branding, do you have any exciting events?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Oh, yes, of course. I think perhaps as early as at the end of this year. We changed our name of our company, and we do this conference and we keep saying AfreecaTV and Soop kind of all mixed up together. We need to -- we need some time to get used to those terms.

And still, the company names changed, but then the platform name is still AfreecaTV. And the AfreecaTV will be completely discarded, and we will be truly reborn into Soop will be next year. So I think we can kind of boom up the atmosphere with the end year awards. And some events for the grand opening or grand launching of Soop will be planned. And all these exciting events will happen for sure. It's not going to be just for us, but also we are in consultation with some experts so that these events will be meaningful and fruitful to the streamers and users alike.

And for next year's direction, since we belong to streaming industry and platform and social media, in terms of streaming business, the changes that we're pursuing it's been going on for a long time. The resolution, the picture quality and the time difference and whatnot, these are being all addressed. So we're strengthening ourselves as the platform and the [ SNS ]. The social media will be at the core of all the activities that we carry out.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you. I believe there are additional questions. Okay, it's Mr. Cha Minuh from Goldman Sachs. You mentioned you count MUV in a conservative way. Can you elaborate on that? And to what point would you readjust those MUV counting method? Yes. And there's another question. You mentioned the global Soop has a different back end. What kind of synergy with the local service can we expect? On MUV, what's the number this time?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

5.5 million. In fact, it's -- yes. And 5.5 million is the MUV internally. That's to be shared. But internally, we've never had anything below 6 million. There's about a 1 million difference internally versus communicated externally. I have no idea, in fact. Maybe do you want to answer?

[Unknown Executive]

Sure, I'll try. What we share on an IR format is very, very conservative. So let me tell you what I mean by that. When we count MNV, there's a -- coming from traffic and traffic coming from mobile. And even within mobile, there is a mobile app versus mobile web. As for mobile web, depending on where you are, it changes the base stations, and there is a chance that you are going -- it's going to be repeated, like, double counted. So we've eliminated the mobile web. And we also eliminated some other repetitions or redundancies because we didn't want to double count anything.

We are a publicly listed company. But the fact that we've been very, very conservative, eliminating all these potential overlaps have maybe communicated lower number of MUVs. Now there is a call within our company to harmonize and unify all this method for the indexes. And we need to have some sort of base mark, base point to communicate externally.

Well, maybe next -- from next quarter, we will be able to use new methods of counting MUVs. The trends are going to dramatically change, but I believe that we will just give you more precise and accurate numbers that can be used in the market externally. Okay, thank you. So it's still the first quarter, so get excited for the second quarter of the IR. Next question that was related.

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Well, I'd like to elaborate on MUV. Not just me, but other -- the DNA of the whole company, not just me, but all the employees and the executives here are, I think we're just too careful. We are very careful about disclosing MUV and we don't want to exaggerate. And based on the base station, say, for example, you're seeing something on your app, that means if you move and then if you're detected by a different base station, then it's going to be counted as 2 views?

[Unknown Executive]

Yes.

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

So what's the unit for sale. Sell unit for the base station? Anyway, mobile web has a lot of traffic, even though we excluded on our end but -- and I think these days people give links to each other or sometimes you look at on the web embedded and that kind of behavior is on the rise. And the mobile web traffic has gone up for the last 3 years. So this has to be reflected into our MUV. Definitely for sure. Thank you. And domestically, the synergy with domestic service, well in terms of the service, we kind of look at differently.

It's like a separate K-pop,K-food,K-culture can be some of the examples that we can compare to our service that can be exported. No, it's not going to be exported like that. We're going to create something that is completely localized to Southeast Asia. We're going to, of course, take advantage of the assets, like the eSports events, like for example, the Faker himself is powerful globally and also content himself. So of course, we can tap on that. But then it's not going to be everything. It's not going to be -- it's not going to be the only thing that we service to the global Soop, because there are other assets, too, other elements like the contents or the assets can be utilized to service to -- to be serviced to the global Soop.

And for example, when we do the APAC game tournament happening in the region, and we had those tournaments. So when we hold such tournaments more often, then that can be used on Korean Soop and also global Soop. And also it's going to take some time for Soop to get settled down, like, for example, I would say, like 2 years. During that time, Korea Soop and global Soop can work together to synergize for the production. And we have been talking about the studio's infrastructure. And recently, the studio infrastructure is being reviewed quite actively internally. And the FreecUP Studio or Sangam eSports or -- stadium or Lotte World, these studios have some limitations in terms of what it can do to meet the needs of the new media users.

And I went to the ASL stadium for the awards, and I saw the physical limitation of the stadium. So we have to address that. While doing so, we have to keep the global Soop in mind. So for that, we will definitely need to either improve or add more infrastructure for the global Soop. We cannot do this with some kind of -- we cannot just rent on a kind of an old space. We have to have a new type of infrastructure. We have been thinking about this for a while, but this cannot be done that quickly because it's a real estate. So there are certain spots that we're looking at. So when it's shaped, then we will communicate with you.

And the competitiveness of global Soop and [indiscernible] will be reflected into the global Soop. I'm going to tell you more about the back end -- the functionalities in the back end. So let's talk about the simulcast as an example. We have had language barriers, which took us a while to go global. But recently, we have many features and functions that have improved over time. And our development have really focused on that so we could do simulcast, like subtitles, for example. Let's say we can do simulcast in Korea, and this time, you will have the Thai subtitle. So it's already tested and it's already available. So when we launch in May, it'll be available.

The AfreecaTV platform is already there and there are many streamers, and they can maybe apply as an ambassador of a sort to do the simulcast. Once we get the applications, we will maybe give them the IDs given out to each one of them. So the --so our platform can be available for the global communication. So in the back end, we have the simulcast features available, and that can lead to synergy, I believe.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you very much for that answer. Actually, I had one question. I believe many streamers are curious about simulcast. In order to become a simulcast equipped streamer, for example, what are the requirements?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

We don't have any requirements set at this point. We thought about whether we want to open this capabilities or not. The global Soop in the Southeast Asian market should be very well adjusted and aligned with the markets there. It's not simply copying and paste from Korea, which means that the content from AfreecaTV should not confuse this new one in Southeast Asian market, which is why we wanted to have certain people in the global market that have the power to convince and communicate with the global markets.

And that's why we cannot use a unified or one size fits it all. We cannot have certain standards or requirements that are quantified. We need to make sure that we find people that will be fully aligned with the global Soop just by looking at their quality of the content. So we cannot give you any specific numbers or anything like that.

[Unknown Executive]

Well, Star Balloons, we got so many Star Balloons and Ad Balloons. Thank you so much. And we also have the member -- 338th member of the fan club. Wow. We are joined by so many people. So how was today? I think, yes, the questions have come up and if there's no additional question, we can wrap up. Oh, wow, 100 Star Balloons from [ Dahuna Young ]. Thank you so much. Thank you. So please ask a question in the chat box, if you have a question. So let's wait around a little bit to see if there are any other questions. Oh, thank you so much for the ad balloons.

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes, there are regular users who joined us for this call, right?

[Unknown Executive]

Yes. I think we have about 200 people. Oh, yes, they came here because they're part of the fan club. Thank you for joining us, everybody. Thank you for your Star Balloons. Why do we get so many Star Balloons all of a sudden? Thank you.[ Phukanzan Dharamji ], thank you. [ Kiridyu ], thank you.

As a streamer myself, I have a question. So of the new streamers, there are quite many virtual streamers. Can you tell us about how active they are and what kind of support do you have planned for them?

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Ellen, will you elaborate on that?

[Unknown Executive]

Yes, virtual streamers are new type of streamers. If you go back 2 years back, there were no virtual streamers. But they're new, and that means they create new content, and they're communicated in a very new way. And it's very meaningful that they have been quite successful. And the new streamers who come on board, who are shy and now going virtual, there's no obstacle because they don't have to reveal themselves.

And there are so many people who are talented. So they overcome their fear and they can be themselves on the platform. And we give them all the necessary support, all the basic support. And in terms of the system and the programs, whenever they have any problem, they get back to us and we give them all full support.

The virtual streamers' content competition is sometimes produced by us, which will boost creation of such content. This is a very new type of format, and it's very exciting to see, and we look forward to the expansion of this market. Thank you.

[Chan-Yong Jung, executive]

Yes, for virtual, I think it's a very strong and evident trend which is likely to expand and grow, for sure. I actually think to myself sometimes the virtual streamers can maybe have a fan meeting in an offline setting or actually to make it feel very much like an offline fan meeting that we have had for a long time. For VR, it didn't grow fast enough because of the content issues. But for virtual streamers, I think we can definitely solve those issues that we face in the virtual world -- VR world. So make it very, very immersive, very, very real. So that's something of a possibility that we're looking at now.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you very much. And we want to also thank all these Star Balloons and the last person [ Mendona Kobin ], you become the 305th person in our fan club. Congratulations. And we all want to thank you very much.

Okay, I don't believe there are any further questions and we're going to wrap up here. I think there's a bit of a rain and drizzling here and there. And in Soop, the forest, I hope that we can grow as a new brand and really open up a new chapter. Thank you all very much for your attention. Thank you.

[Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]